Happy New Year to all following the western, or Gregorian calendar. It’s important to remember, time is relative and calendars mutable; like other things we may regard as solid, (say economic systems) nothing is changeless, nor eternal.

Take India’s rupee; late last year, prime minister Narendra Modi launched, depending upon your point of view, an either visionary, or draconian demonetization program aimed, he says, at “black money, terrorism, and tax evasion.” His critics however wonder if there’s not more behind the unprecedented move to take both the 500 and 1,000 rupee notes, workhorses of the nation’s currency accounting for more than 85% of cash transactions, off the street and onto a controlled grid.

And; it’s not only India witnessing an economic paradigm shift. Across the planet, Bitcoin and its many imitators, had been received as both a halyard of hope to rescue upward mobility for the embattled middle and working classes, and harbinger of an impending doom, promising chaos by delivering the economy into the hands of internet fraudsters and shadowy networks of web gangsters.

Though the early application of cryptocurrencies had problems, the implementation of a more sophisticated Blockchain 2.0 database insures a more secure regimen. But, there’s more to ushering in a new age of money than ones and zeroes, what’s needed too is a social and necessarily political framework, a context from which the new system can operate. That’s were the Blockchain Party comes in.

Richard Kastelein is a media and technology activist, educator, and entrepreneur. He’s the publisher and editor-in-chief of Blockchain News, a co-founder of Blockchain Partners, director of The Hackitarians Foundation, and now moves into the political sphere with BCP, the Blockchain Party.

Richard Kastelein and bringing new politics to the new money in the second half.

And; Victoria Street Newz publisher emeritus and CFUV Radio broadcaster, Janine Bandcroft will not be joining us at the bottom of the hour to bring us news of some of the good things the coming week promises on in and around the streets of our town, and beyond there too, Christina Nikolic will instead step into the breach. But first, Satya Sagar and putting an biometric thumb in the eye of India’s financial system.